I got a check back from the bank, marked ‘insufficient funds’. I gave them a call and asked the manager if he couldn’t just borrow some more from Helicopter Ben?
He was not amused so I offered to deposit some money. I wrote him a check.
He called back to say he couldn’t accept that, the check was no good.
Huh. “Not much of a bank,” I said to him. “If you don’t even honor your own checks!”
Yes. It’s a matter of perspective. Now of course that so often is the heart of a great story. You see, after all, it’s a rare villain who actually sets out to be an evil son-of-a-bitch. Oh it happens, and yes, sometimes the villain knows they’ve been – in the eyes of the fellow he’s just turfed out to die with his family in the snow – a SOB. But actually it seems that even the complete psychopaths who enjoy cruelty will somehow rationalize their acts so that well, they’re scum. We’re important. We needed to do that. They’re not really human. Their daughter needed raping. The child’s head needed kicking in because it was a noisy little bastard. The troops needed a good laugh so we cut open his belly, nailed his guts to the tree and chased him round it, and had bets on how many circuits he could do.
Humans are social animals and despite the thin veneer of civilization we’re still not that far removed from a troop of chimps. Not far enough, anyway, according to the chimps (again a matter of perspective). Now there are a lot of social behavior patterns which are very much hard-wired into us, and the need to justify ourselves to ourselves – a front we then present to the group seem almost unavoidable. The guy who can say ‘I chopped down the cherry tree. And I’ve no excuse, even to myself, for doing that.’ Is exceptional.
And herein lies the issue that the writer has to deal with. Firstly, you have to get inside your character’s heads – or they become caricatures rather than characters (yes, I know. It happens. These days the caricature is likely to be white and male and heterosexual. Once upon a time, they’d have been these greasy swarthy types, and probably homosexual too. It’s fairly weak writing.). And once inside your character’s head it becomes a balancing act of showing that character A is the hero, and character B is the villain – despite the fact that BOTH see themselves as perfectly justified in their actions most of the time. It is, as Kate will testify I am sure, quite hard not get so deep you’re moving ‘facts’ around (which are rather like fish, really, quite slippery and prone to get away. They are not quite as slippery as politicians, bankers, lawyers or authors all of whom change reality to suit the story they present.) The difference is that authors don’t pretend it’s not fiction.
If you don’t watch it, your villains can become heroes, especially when you’re writing third person and shifting to their point of view. The beggar will rise from the dunghill a prince… –
I confess I was trying to do this with Cair. On the other hand I had the advantage in that my actual villains were largely inhuman (and gee, not actually male, white and middle-aged church goers… No wonder I haven’t got a Nebula (phew))
As a writer, the line between allowing their viewpoint to make them into a sympathetic character (with the reader sympathizes/empathizes) and not villain, and a caricature is… slim. Of course sometimes the slippery facts help. So does the other viewpoint/s, and the fact that as the author we can and do slant both of those.
But to me the mark of a great book is the villain I dislike… but can also see where and how they justify themselves.
So: how do you turn villains from being caricatures without making me like them more than your milksop hero? And whose villains are memorable?
Mad Genius Club 
35 responses to “The beggar from the dunghill”
Hmmm, Interesting question, because technically, Dr. Mauser is Evil. although he was forced into the role by international treaty. But the ostensibly good guys, the agents of S.A.B.R.E. for example, are murderous, overzealous thugs.
Eventually he grows into the role, realizing the world he is in doesn’t value human life very much, but he’s a bit different, being very protective of “his” people (no gratuitous minion-shooting). To survive, he must play the game their way, until he can become powerful enough to change the rules.
Interesting point about white male heterosexuals. I’m trying to catch up on reading Asimov’s, since I’m about a year behind – I guess it doesn’t give me nearly as much reading pleasure as it used to – and in two stories in a row the female protagonists were lesbians. Usually just tangentially to the story, it seemed inserted just to score points.
Ah. The count the tokens approach to Political correctness, or the shock value?
One of my favorite hero/villain duos is Samuel Delany’s “Nova”. Lorq VonRey and Prince Red are very similar characters. They are both children of wealth and privilege, raised in empires that are nominally enemies but very similar culturally. They have essentially the same goal, to exploit a scarce natural resource that is formed when a star goes nova.
The real and striking difference between them is their methodology. Lorq is the good guy because of how he decides to go after the prize, and Prince is the bad guy because of his methods.
It’s a novel that, to me, really highlights the importance of personal choice in characterization–neither of them were forced to become who they are, who they are is the result of the choices they make.
Which is a neat example of clever writing
Is it cheating to say that my best villain (in something I’ve written, that is) is also my hero? (Hey, the dude started out with really great intentions. But we all know the proverb. And it also turns out that the paving contract on that proverbial road-to-Hell is mighty lucrative, to boot.)
For that matter, is it cheating that right around the time I (as the writer) woke up and realized “hey, this isn’t really a hero’s story anymore…it’s more like a villain’s!”, the character on the page started coming to the same realization, and the story turned from what had been a fairly trite wish-fulfillment fantasy that was poised to go on forever into a proper novel about a dude who inadvertently sells his soul in the first couple of scenes, and spends most of the book trying to (proverbially) buy it back?
Heh. Thank you for proving my point. “As a writer, the line between allowing their viewpoint to make them into a sympathetic character (with the reader sympathizes/empathizes) and not villain, and a caricature is… slim. “
For my money, the best villain in history is Weis and Hickman’s Raistlin Majere. He fits so well with the audience for the books, having grown up as a nerd, that he really resonates. His plot to take over the world and sell everyone out in the process is tempered by the fact that he redeems his brother and prevents a takeover by Takhisis, his world’s devil. His love for Chrysania is touching too, until he sells her out.
A memorable villain, yes.
Memorable villains seem to fall into two rough groups. There are those who are very believable, usually the ones that start out with “decent” intentions (I will make the world a better place for my family/people/the children; the system is corrupt and is crushing us and we must fight it) and then keep going (only I can save us, no matter what the cost is; since ‘they’ won’t understand why [their cause] is evil and corrupt, they all must be removed) and farther down that oh-so-well graded and paved road to Perdition. Then there are the utterly over-the-top, scenery chewing baddies that let the reader sit back and just enjoy the show. Those villains don’t get long academic deconstructions of their motives, but readers don’t care: we just buy the stories and cheer, boo, and throw popcorn at the appropriate places. 🙂
Gollum and Sauron?
“But to me the mark of a great book is the villain I dislike… but can also see where and how they justify themselves.” Exactly.
BTW, the reason for the white heterosexual males as villains goes along with the fact that, in the real world, it is somewhat easier for them to gather power to themselves, and power corrupts. They make easier targets – a different villain requires explaining how someone could get enough power to do evil in the first place. Very general explanation for lazy writing.
The place where the villain justifies him/herself is where the memorable can come from, and the sympathy for the villain. And any scenes from the villain’s point of view can show the distorted, but justified, thinking that leads to them feeling they have no choice/are the good guys. Witness the Godfather.
If you can get a reader to say that, in those exact circumstances they might have to behave exactly as the villain did, then you’ve got a resonant, if not sympathetic villain. A la Dexter.
If the villain starts to take over the story, give yourself a pat on the back for writing a strong character, and have the rest of your characters ‘man up.’
A good writer can justify anything.
The problem with this is that unless you are writing heroic fantasy and/or space opera, it takes very little power to do either good or evil. In fact it probably takes less power to do evil than good. As a trite but true example, how much power does it take to take candy from a baby?
There was a line in one story I read that went “People who talk about how easy it is to take candy from a baby haven’t tried to take candy from a baby”. [Very Big Grin]
Oh yeah. Those darling little white “teefs” are quite sharp and can be applied with a surprising amount of force.
That’s rather like ‘sleep like a baby’ – depends on the baby. We were lucky with ours, but my best mat’s second one never slept more than 2 hours at a stretch for 18 months…
Oh yes. Same here. One day, when Marsh was three, I realized I was feeling… odd. It was this feeling I dimly remembered but not recently. And then it hit me. I’d slept the WHOLE night. (In his defense, he had asthma and various respiratory issues and then heart issues. The slightest murmur and I was up and by his bed.)
point. Well, aside from babies LIKING candy and clinging to it, the scenario with for example bullies is that they are often those who actually are not strong in competition with their peers-by-size/age. The really strong have no need to prove it to themselves by beating up little ‘uns.
‘A good writer can justify anything.’ – indeed. Authors are -in their own books – as close to playing God as humans get. Only writing something that suspends disbelief can remind us just how hard and complex being God must be. 🙂
For villains, I keep in mind people I don’t like. People that irritate me. Especially people dismissive of other people’s opinions, and right to chose for themselves. You know the kind: “Oh, those people just need to [fill in the blank] and then they’d be prosperous and happy.” Add power, up the arrogance, and lower their empathy toward their fellow (fellow? I have nothing in common with _them_) intelligent beings, and they make great Bad Guys.
Leave them with a little sense of shame, a pinch of empathy, and ego rather than arrogance, and they make pretty good “good” characters too.
Good or Bad, characters need a personality.
precisely. And a personality needs getting into their point of view.
For old fashioned scene chewing badness, it’s hard to beat Emperor Cartagia. “Humor is so subjective”.
Ah, but his own internal logic was sound…
How can you argue with a god? 🙂
Very Very Carefully. [Wink]
In _Pontius Pilate_ by Paul L. Maier, the author had Pilate trying to convince him that putting a statue of himself in the Jewish Temple was “not a good idea”. Didn’t work but when Cartagia was getting annoyed with Pilate, Pilate claimed that Zeus told him to be completely honest with Cartagia (remember Cartagia thought he was a son of Zeus). Pilate then did some fast talking about how Cartagia would look so much better later on.
By the way, Cartagia wanting a statue of himself the Temple is historical but word of his death reached Jerusalem before the statue was placed there.
“Cartagia […] is historical”
Um…what?
I mean, I know JMS is an awesome writer, and all, but I wasn’t aware he had the power to make his characters actually historical. 🙂 (As opposed to the more normal path of building his fictional characters out of aspects of historical people.)
Ugh, I was thinking about the Roman Emperor. [Frown]
Caligula, maybe? Because I’m pretty sure Cartagia is just the name of a Babylon 5 character.
Very likely. Of course, if *I* tried to spell “Caligula”, I might spell it “Cartagia”. [Sad Smile]
Now JMS likely chose the name “Cartagia” as a reference to Caligula.
The actor himself was thinking more Lord Byron, “mad, bad and dangerous to know”.
It’s been a while since I read “A Mankind Witch”, but I thought the villians (or at least one of them) WAS white 😉
heh. Fair point. And male. Do I get remission for the fact that he wasn’t human?
one of my all time fave bad guys was the telepath Baxter on Babylon 5, portrayed by Walter Koenig. Nine times out of ten I was hoping he would succeed in whatever scheme he was up to.
To me however, as a budding author, I had more fun writing my bad guys than the good guys. Any reason as to why?
You mean Bester and yeah he was one of the villains you could really understand even while you hated him.
Yes, Bester. My apologies.
No problem. I had to look some of it up myself because my memory is turning into Swiss cheese. (The character Bester was named after the author Alfred Bester. Not someone I’ve read but apparently famous for his stories with telepaths.)